Systems and methods for electronic platform for inventory sharing

ABSTRACT

A computer-implemented method for managing data associated with electronic inventory management of wearable articles includes receiving, wearable article data describing wearable articles made available for physical shipment to users via electronic interactions, wherein one or more electronic interfaces are accessible over one or more networks. The method includes assigning a category to one or more wearable articles described in the wearable article data, the category being selected from a plurality of categories including a first category for selection by a first plurality of users and a second category for selection by a second plurality of users. The method also includes monitoring availability data, the availability data indicating an availability of one or more wearable articles for selection by one or more users interacting with a first electronic storefront, a second electronic storefront, or both, and initiating one or more services to facilitate physical shipment of a first wearable article.

TECHNICAL FIELD

Aspects of the present disclosure relate to an electronic platform fordistribution and inventory management of wearable items and, moreparticularly, to dynamically managing electronic data associated withdynamic allocations of articles, such as wearable items.

BACKGROUND

Services for providing articles, including electronically-presentedservices, typically adhere to an established, conventional structure. Inthese services, entities such as retailers design and manufacture, orotherwise obtain, a series of products that are offered for purchase. Inthe example of wearable articles including garments, a group of productscan be offered for a period of time, such as a season, after which thearticles are offered at a reduced price. Entities offering articles viaone or more electronic destinations, such as a website, employconventional allocation strategies, allotting each individual article toa particular purpose. For example, articles are allocated for purchaseso that when stock of a particular article is exhausted, the website canbe updated appropriately. When a large number of articles are present(e.g., unsold) after a period of time, the website or other electronicdestination can be updated with a reduced price to encourage selectionof these articles. Each article, and often the electronic destinationitself, is typically dedicated to a specific purpose, such as one-timepurchases, auction-style purchases, rentals, etc.

While article subscriptions have recently experienced increasedvisibility and market importance, there are circumstances where aone-time rental system is desirable. However, implementing new systemsto enable a new service, presents numerous technical challenges thatinvolve significant design efforts and infrastructure to support newinventory systems, user experience design, cost structure, and others.Thus, conventional systems lack the capabilities to flexibly anddynamically link a plurality of service types (e.g., one-time purchases,one-time rentals, and/or subscription services), identify differentusers across these services, and facilitate interactions betweendifferent types of entities involved in management of these services.Additionally, while operating one of these services involves thegeneration and tracking of vast amounts of information that may beuseful for monitoring storefront performance, service-type performance,article performance, etc., this information is generated and stored byindividual entities and/or for an individual service. Thus, the abilityto dynamically monitor, update, and analyze this information is limited.

The background description provided herein is for the purpose ofgenerally presenting the context of the disclosure. Unless otherwiseindicated herein, the materials described in this section are not priorart to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be priorart, or suggestions of the prior art, by inclusion in this section.

SUMMARY OF THE DISCLOSURE

According to certain aspects of the disclosure, systems and methods aredisclosed for dynamically managing electronic data associated with aplurality of services, such as services associated with wearable itemsor other articles offered by a plurality of entities, including entitieshaving different roles (e.g., hosting entities, fulfiller entities, andothers).

In one aspect, a computer-implemented method for managing dataassociated with electronic inventory management of wearable articles mayinclude receiving, by one or more processors, wearable article data fromone or more electronic interfaces, the wearable article data describingwearable articles made available for physical shipment to users viaelectronic interactions, wherein the one or more electronic interfacesare accessible over one or more networks. The method may includeassigning, by the one or more processors, a category to one or morewearable articles described in the wearable article data, the categorybeing selected from a plurality of categories including a first categoryfor selection by a first plurality of users and a second category forselection by a second plurality of users, the category being stored ascategorization assignment data. The method may also include monitoring,by the one or more processors, availability data included in thewearable article data for one or more wearable articles, theavailability data indicating an availability of one or more wearablearticles for selection by one or more users interacting with a firstelectronic storefront, an availability of the one or more articles forselection by one or more users interacting with a second electronicstorefront, or both, and in response to receiving one or more userselections via the first electronic storefront, the second electronicstorefront, or both, initiating one or more services to facilitatephysical shipment of a first wearable article.

In another aspect, a computer system for managing data associated withelectronic inventory management of wearable articles may include amemory having processor-readable instructions stored therein and one ormore processors configured to access the memory and execute theprocessor-readable instructions. The processor-readable instructions,when executed by the one or more processors may configure the one ormore processors to perform a plurality of functions. The functions mayinclude functions for receiving, by the one or more processors, wearablearticle data from one or more electronic interfaces, the wearablearticle data describing wearable articles made available for physicalshipment to users via electronic interactions, wherein the one or moreelectronic interfaces are accessible over one or more networks, andassigning, by the one or more processors, a category to one or morewearable articles described in the wearable article data, the categorybeing selected from a plurality of categories including a first categoryfor selection by a first plurality of users and a second category forselection by a second plurality of users. The functions may furtherinclude functions for monitoring, by the one or more processors,availability data included in the wearable article data for one or morewearable articles, the availability data indicating an availability ofone or more wearable articles for selection by one or more usersinteracting with a first electronic storefront, an availability of theone or more articles for selection by one or more users interacting witha second electronic storefront, or both, and in response to receivingone or more user selections via the first electronic storefront, thesecond electronic storefront, or both, initiating one or more servicesto facilitate physical shipment of a first wearable article.

In yet another aspect, a non-transitory computer-readable medium maycontain instructions for performing functions for managing dataassociated with electronic inventory management of wearable articles.The functions may include receiving wearable article data from one ormore electronic interfaces, the wearable article data describingwearable articles made available for physical shipment to users viaelectronic interactions, wherein the one or more electronic interfacesare accessible over one or more networks, and assigning a category toone or more wearable articles described in the wearable article data,the category being selected from a plurality of categories including afirst category for selection by a first plurality of users and a secondcategory for selection by a second plurality of users, the categorybeing stored as categorization assignment data. The functions mayfurther include monitoring availability data included in the wearablearticle data for one or more wearable articles, the availability dataindicating an availability of one or more wearable articles forselection by one or more users interacting with a first electronicstorefront, an availability of the one or more articles for selection byone or more users interacting with a second electronic storefront, orboth, and in response to receiving one or more user selections via thefirst electronic storefront, the second electronic storefront, or both,initiating one or more services to facilitate physical shipment of afirst wearable article.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute apart of this specification, illustrate various exemplary embodiments andtogether with the description, serve to explain the principles of thedisclosed embodiments.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an exemplary environment in which methods,systems, and other aspects of the present disclosure may be implemented.

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram depicting an architecture of an exemplaryenvironment for dynamically-updateable inventories of articles, such aswearable items, of an electronic platform for offering the articles as aservice, according to one or more embodiments.

FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram depicting the architecture of an exemplaryserver system for an electronic platform with dynamically-updateableinventories, according to one or more embodiments.

FIG. 4A is a diagram showing interactions of a plurality of entities andusers associated with an exemplary transaction rental service, accordingto one or more embodiments.

FIG. 4B is a diagram illustrating an exemplary transaction rentalsequence, according to one or more embodiments.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing an exemplary user environment, according toone or more embodiments.

FIG. 6 is a representation of an exemplary data store, such as anallocation database, according to one or more embodiments.

FIG. 7 is a flowchart of an exemplary method for dynamically managinginventory data associated with article purchase and/or transactionrental systems, according to one or more embodiments.

FIG. 8 depicts an exemplary computer device or system, in whichembodiments of the present disclosure, or portions thereof, may beimplemented.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS

The following embodiments describe systems and methods for dynamicallymanaging inventory data associated with articles, such as apparel orother wearable items associated with purchase services, rental services,and/or subscription services. In particular, aspects of the presentdisclosure may relate to systems and methods for managing inventoryassignment for a plurality of entities in which one or more articles aremade available for selection by a user interacting with an interfaceprovided on behalf of a hosting entity.

While the exemplary system architecture as described in the presentdisclosure relates to electronic transactions for subscribing to,purchasing, or renting wearable items (e.g., by offeringclothing-as-a-service (CaaS) or other articles-as-a-service, aTry-Then-Buy (TTB) service such as a service for renting an article fora set or flexible period of time with the option to purchase the articleat a discounted TTB price, transaction rental services, etc.),implementations disclosed herein may effectively serve various otheronline transactions in the context of any other subscription, purchase,rental, or retail services without departing from the scope of thedisclosure, such as, for example, subscribing to or making purchases ina software service, cleaning service, delivery service, maintenanceservice, rental product, rental vehicles, etc. In addition, while somedescriptions and examples disclosed in the present disclosure refer tocertain exemplary interactions (e.g., transactions) as transactionspertaining to “apparel,” “garments,” “wearable articles,” or “wearableitems,” all of those transactions may effectively serve any article orconsumer good without departing from the scope of the disclosure.

As used in the present disclosure, the term “CaaS” (i.e.,clothing-as-a-service) may collectively refer to computer-implementedservices and functions associated with subscription, purchase, and/orrental services for users (e.g., periodic subscription for receivingwearable items, apparel rental or purchase order, distribution, returnprocessing, TTB services, transaction rental services, accountmanagement, marketing, customer service, warehouse operations, etc.). Asused in the present disclosure, the terms “wearable item” and/or“wearable article” may refer to any article of clothing, apparel,jewelry, hat, accessories, or other product which may be worn by aperson, an animal, or a thing, or be used as an ornament for a person,an animal, or a thing. As used herein, the term “closeting” or “tocloset” may refer to a computer-implemented operation of placing one ormore garments into a virtual closet (e.g., a cart, a repository, or anytype of space which may be virtually associated with a particular set ofone or more garments for a future transaction). Additionally, “matching”may refer to a computer-implemented operation of determining a set ofone or more garments for allocating to a user and/or determiningwearability metrics for given garments, and “allocating” or “allocation”may refer to a computer-implemented operation of determining garmentsthat should be assigned and shipped to one or more particular users.“Allocating” or “allocation” may also refer to computer-implementedoperations for determining garments that should be assigned to one ormore pools or groups of articles made available for selection by a uservia a transaction rental service. An “inventory” may refer to aplurality of articles that are associated with one or more entities. A“catalog” may refer to a plurality of articles associated with one ormore entities, such as one or more articles presented via an electronicstorefront and/or via an interface of an inventory exchange. The term“physical inventory” includes articles physically provided to alogistics center, warehouse, or one or more other location(s).

In accordance with the present disclosure, user interfaces, periodicallyexecuted computer-implemented services, ad hoc services, and automationsbeing integrated together in a connected platform may be achieved by auniquely configured system architecture, configuring one or moreprocessors to perform storefront and back office tasks, and various userinterfaces providing specialized or customized access to entitiesassociated with one or more roles. For example, the system may collectvast amounts of information and data attributes from historicaltransactions with users, historical transactions or other interactions,form data sets indicative of different entities' relationships withcertain articles and/or other entities, etc. These interfaces, services,and automations may be useful for operating and managing an articletransaction rental service and synchronizing information between thestorefronts associated with the various entities with an inventoryavailability and valuation service.

Article merchants of all types, and in particular, apparel retailers,invest significant resources developing effective systems to facilitatearticle interactions, including article purchases. However, manysystems, and indeed numerous industries including the apparel, jewelry,and other consumer products industries, to name a few, remainownership-based, such that users purchase individual articles bynavigating a website, in a manner that is analogous to interacting witha physical retail location. Due to this ownership-based model, a user'spurchasing power limits access to articles that are offered for sale byarticle merchants. Thus, end-users are unable to access articles thatwill be used a limited number of times and/or that have a relativelyhigh cost. Systems and methods described herein may, in at least someembodiments, allow end-users to access articles at a fraction of thepurchase cost, retain the article as long as desired, and purchase thearticle when desired. Additionally, as users have become morevalue-conscious, a rental option is desirable in many circumstances. Insome embodiments, entities may, by use of the disclosed methods andsystems, create new monetization channels for their article(s). Thechannels may result in either or both an increase in or more consistentand predictable demand. Additionally, in at least some embodiments,entities may benefit from increased user retention, which may facilitateincreased brand loyalty, which would otherwise be reduced when userpurchasing power is reduced.

The subject matter of the present description will now be described morefully hereinafter with reference to the accompanying drawings, whichform a part thereof, and which show, by way of illustration, specificexemplary embodiments. An embodiment or implementation described hereinas “exemplary” is not to be construed as preferred or advantageous, forexample, over other embodiments or implementations; rather, it isintended to reflect or indicate that the embodiment(s) is/are “example”embodiment(s). Subject matter can be embodied in a variety of differentforms and, therefore, covered or claimed subject matter is intended tobe construed as not being limited to any exemplary embodiments set forthherein; exemplary embodiments are provided merely to be illustrative.Likewise, a reasonably broad scope for claimed or covered subject matteris intended. Among other things, subject matter may be embodied asmethods, devices, components, or systems. Accordingly, embodiments may,for example, take the form of hardware, software, firmware, or anycombination thereof (other than software per se). The following detaileddescription is, therefore, not intended to be taken in a limiting sense.

Throughout the specification and claims, terms may have nuanced meaningssuggested or implied in context beyond or in addition to an explicitlystated meaning. Likewise, the phrase “in one embodiment” as used hereindoes not necessarily refer to the same embodiment or aspect of thedisclosure and the phrase “in another embodiment” as used herein doesnot necessarily refer to a different embodiment or aspect of thedisclosure. It is intended, for example, that claimed subject matterinclude combinations of exemplary embodiments in whole or in part.

The terminology used below may be interpreted in its broadest reasonablemanner, even though it is being used in conjunction with a detaileddescription of certain specific examples of the present disclosure.Indeed, certain terms may even be emphasized below; however, anyterminology intended to be interpreted in any restricted manner will beovertly and specifically defined as such in this Detailed Descriptionsection. Both the foregoing general description and the followingdetailed description are exemplary and explanatory only and are notrestrictive of the features, as claimed.

In this disclosure, the term “based on” means “based at least in parton.” The singular forms “a,” “an,” and “the” include plural referentsunless the context dictates otherwise. The term “exemplary” is used inthe sense of “example” rather than “ideal.” The term “or” is meant to beinclusive and means either, any, several, or all of the listed items.The terms “comprises,” “comprising,” “includes,” “including,” or othervariations thereof, are intended to cover a non-exclusive inclusion suchthat a process, method, or product that comprises a list of elementsdoes not necessarily include only those elements, but may include otherelements not expressly listed or inherent to such a process, method,article, or apparatus. Relative terms, such as, “substantially” and“generally,” are used to indicate a possible variation of ±10% of astated or understood value.

I. Exemplary System Environment

FIG. 1 shows an example environment 100, according to one or moreembodiments of the present disclosure. As shown, the example environment100 may include one or more networks 101 that interconnect a serversystem 102, user devices 112, employee devices 116, entity devices 118,132, 142, and external systems 122. The one or more networks 101 may be,for example, one or more of a cellular network, a public land mobilenetwork, a local area network, a wide area network, a metropolitan areanetwork, a telephone network, a private network, an ad hoc network, anintranet, the Internet, a fiber optic based network, a cloud computingnetwork, etc. User devices 112 may be accessed by users 108, employeedevices 116 may be accessed by authorized employees 114, and entitydevices 118, 132, 142 may be accessed by different entities 120, 136,146, as described below. In some implementations, employee devices 116may be used to perform or supplement the functions of entity devices118, 132, 142 and/or the functions of user devices 112. A server system102 may comprise one or more servers 104 and one or more databases 106,which may be configured to store and/or process a plurality of data,microservices, and service components, and/or associated functionsthereof, as described in more detail below with respect to FIGS. 2 and3.

Users 108 may access server system 102 through the one or more networks101 via user devices 112. Each device among user devices 112 may be anytype of computing device (e.g., personal computing device, mobilecomputing device, etc.) which allows users 108 to display a web browseror a web-based application for accessing the server system 102 throughthe network 101. User devices 112 may, for example, be configured todisplay a web browser, a web-based application, or any other userinterface (e.g., one or more mobile applications) for allowing users 108to exchange information with other device(s) or system(s) in environment100 over the one or more networks 101. For example, user devices 112 mayload an application with a graphical user interface (GUI), and theapplication may display, on the GUI, one or more article recommendationsfor closeting and/or for transaction rental by the user. Users 108accessing user devices 112 may be, for example, users and/or potentialusers of articles made available for subscription-based, transactionrental-based, and/or purchase-based distribution via electronictransactions and physical shipment. Additionally, or alternatively,users 108 may access user devices 112 to, for example, view articlesthat were ordered as part of a transaction rental service, manage one ormore user accounts, view catalogs, configure one or more user profiles,engage in customer service communications, make purchase orders, trackshipments, generate shipments, monitor order fulfillment processes,initiate or process returns, order apparel for purchase, providefeedback, refer other users, navigate through various features such assize advisor, perform personalized discovery, and/or makerecommendations.

Employee devices 116 may be configured to be accessed by one or moreemployees 114, including, for example, customer service employees,marketer employees, warehouse employees, analytics employees, or anyother employees who are authorized and/or authenticated to performtasks, operations, and/or transactions associated with server system102, and/or external systems 122. In at least one embodiment, employeedevices 116 are owned and operated by the same entity or at least anaffiliate of the entity operating the e-commerce (e.g., CaaS) businesshosted on server systems 102. Each employee device 116 may be any typeof computing device (e.g., personal computing device, mobile computingdevices, etc.). Employee devices 116 may allow employees 114 to displaya web browser or an application for accessing the server system 102and/or the external systems 122, through the one or more networks 101.For example, an employee device 116 may load an application withgraphical user interface (GUI), and the application may display on theGUI one or more warehouse operations associated with providing CaaS tousers 108. In some implementations, employee devices 116 may communicatedirectly with server system 102 via communications link 117, bypassingpublic networks 101. Additionally, or alternatively, employee devices116 may communicate with server system 102 via network 101 (e.g., accessby web browsers or web-based applications).

Entity devices 118, 132, 142 may be configured to be accessed by one ormore entities, such as one or more fulfiller entities 120, one or morehosting entities 136 associated with a hosted electronic storefront forarticle transactions (e.g., purchases), and/or one or more additionalentities 146, which may include fulfiller entities, hosting entities,and/or entities that act as both hosting and fulfillment entities, asdescribed below. A fulfiller entity 120 may include, in at least someimplementations, a “tenant” entity that interacts with a CaaS operatorto engage one or more subscribing users and offer articles as part of aservice (e.g., a subscription service) to participants in the service(e.g., users 108). However, fulfiller entities 120 are not necessarilytenants of associated with a CaaS operator.

Each device among the devices 118, 132, 142 may be any type of computingdevice (e.g., personal computing device, mobile computing devices,etc.). As used herein, each entity, including one or more entities 120,136, 146, may refer to an entity that receives, supplies, shares, and/orfacilitates article interactions, including one-time rentals, purchases,and/or subscription operations, for one or more collections of apparelor other articles. For example, fulfiller entities 120 and/or additionalentities 146 may include one or more entities that offer a subscriptionservice or other CaaS. The collections of apparel or other articles maybe included as part of one or more CaaS inventories or one or moreseparate inventories to facilitate an article integration service thatallows entities 120, 136, 146 to implement a transaction rental system.For example, each entity 120, 136, 146 may be a retailer, a designer, amanufacturer, a merchandiser, a brand owner, or other entity thatsupplies or otherwise makes available one or more collections (e.g.,catalogs) of wearable items to one or more CaaS inventories managedand/or accessed by the server system 102.

Entities 120, 136, 146 may be configured to interact with each other,via an article integration service, according to one or more roles, asdescribed below. For example, fulfillment or fulfiller entities 120 maybe entities that provide a plurality of articles to one or more physicalinventories of a CaaS, and ultimately, for use by other entities, suchas one or more hosting entities 136. In some embodiments, fulfillerentities 120 may provide one or more articles directly to one or morehosting entities 136 and/or one or more users 108 associated with one ormore hosting entities 136.

Hosting entities 136 may, via one or more electronic storefronts, makearticles available to one or more users 108. These electronicstorefronts may be configured as storefronts for purchasing articles. Itshould be appreciated that an entity may not always be a “fulfillerentity” vs. a “hosting entity.” Rather, an entity may be a fulfiller vs.hosting entity depending on which side of a transaction the entity ison, for any given transaction. It is contemplated that, at any givenmoment, an entity may be a “hosting entity” with respect to a firsttransaction involving a first entity, while simultaneously acting as a“fulfiller entity” with respect to a second transaction involving asecond entity. Additional entities 146 may include entities that act asboth fulfiller and hosting entities 120, 136, and/or entities thatfacilitate article integration in electronic storefront catalogs of aplurality of entities (e.g., one or more fulfiller entities 120 and oneor more hosting entities 136).

As described in more detail below with respect to FIG. 3, entities 120,136, 146 may use one or more electronic entity interfaces (e.g., acatalog content management system associated with each entity) toprovide server system 102 with wearable item data that describe apparelor wearable items made available for allocation across one or moreinventories via server system 102. For example, one or more catalogs foreach of the one or more entities 120, 136, 146 may be generated and/orupdated at the server system 102 dynamically and/or periodically. Serversystem 102 may further facilitate services for making one or morearticles available for transaction rental(s) via a storefront for one ormore hosting entities 136. For example, one or more articles may bedesignated or selected for inclusion in a pooled inventory, where sucharticles may be offered for a transaction rental service via one or moreelectronic storefronts associated with hosting entities 136, asdescribed below. At least one of these articles may be offered inanother service (e.g., a subscription service and/or an expedited systemcomponent of the subscription service) in addition to the transactionrental service, and thus may be considered to be “pooled” between thetwo services. While the multiple services associated with one or morepooled articles may be offered by different entities (e.g., a fulfillerentity 120 that offers one or more articles for selection as part of asubscription service and a hosting entity 136 that offers transactionrentals via articles in an inventory for the subscription service of thefulfiller entity 120), in some implementations the multiple services maybe associated with a single entity (e.g., a single fulfiller or hostingentity 120, 136).

Devices 118, 132, 142 may serve as access terminals for the entities120, 136, 146 for communicating with electronic interfaces and/or othersubsystems hosted at server system 102. Entity devices 118, 132, 142may, for example, be configured to display a web browser, anapplication, or any other user interface for allowing entities 120, 136,146 to load electronic interfaces and/or exchange data with otherdevice(s) or system(s) in the environment 100 over the one or morenetworks 101.

External systems 122 may be, for example, one or more third party and/orauxiliary systems that integrate and/or communicate with the serversystem 102 in performing various CaaS tasks. Specific examples of theexternal systems 122 are described in detail below with respect to FIGS.2 and 3. External systems 122 may be in communication with otherdevice(s) or system(s) in the environment 100 over the one or morenetworks 101. For example, external systems 122 may communicate with theserver system 102 via API (application programming interface) accessover the one or more networks 101, and also communicate with theemployee devices 116 via web browser access over the one or morenetworks 101.

As indicated above, FIG. 1 is provided merely as an example. Otherexamples that differ from the example environment 100 of FIG. 1 arecontemplated within the scope of the present embodiments. In addition,the number and arrangement of devices and networks shown in environment100 are provided as an example. In practice, there may be additionaldevices, fewer devices and/or networks, different devices and/ornetworks, or differently arranged devices and/or networks than thoseshown in environment 100. Furthermore, two or more devices shown in FIG.1 may be implemented within a single device, or a single device shown inFIG. 1 may be implemented as multiple, distributed devices.Additionally, or alternatively, one or more devices may perform one ormore functions of other devices in the example environment 100. Forexample, employee devices 116 may be configured to perform one or morefunctions of devices 118, 132, 142, in addition to their own functions.

II. Exemplary Architecture

FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of an exemplary architecture 200 for anelectronic platform for offering clothing-as-a-service and/orarticles-as-a-service utilizing article integration service(s),according to one or more embodiments. The components of architecture 200may be accessed by authorized terminals, such as fulfiller/hostingentity devices 202 and user devices 204, over the one or more networks101 or via any one or more other types of network (e.g., a cellularnetwork, a public land mobile network, a local area network, a wide areanetwork, a metropolitan area network, a telephone network, a privatenetwork, an ad hoc network, an intranet, the internet, a fiber opticbased network, a cloud computing network, etc.). As used herein, userdevices 204 may correspond to any one or more user devices 112 of users108 depicted in FIG. 1. One or more of the employee devices 116 depictedin FIG. 1 may also access architecture 200 (e.g., via one or moreinternal applications). Fulfiller/hosting devices 202 may correspond todevices 118 of fulfiller entities 120, devices 132 of hosting entities136, and/or devices 142 of additional entities 146. Devices 202 may, inat least some circumstances, also correspond to one or more employeedevices 116.

As shown in FIG. 2, in general, architecture 200 may comprise aninternal system 206, external user facing apps 208, a web applicationhosting server 210, external systems 212, and applications for inventoryintegration 216 which may be part of internal system 206 and/or formedby one or more external entity-facing applications. If desired,architecture 200 may include one or more entity data and analyticssystems (not shown) to assess performance of, for example,individually-branded storefronts of entities 120, 136, 146. Internalsystem 206 may comprise applications for inventory integration 216, APIendpoints 218, APP endpoints 220, login endpoints 222, inventoryservices 224, and inventory allocation data stores or data storagesystems 226.

II.A. Internal System

In operation, devices 202 may access internal system 206, which may bestored at networked, distributed, and/or local systems (e.g., one ormore virtual private clouds and/or one or more physical privatenetworks). As used herein, a virtual private cloud may refer to aconfigurable pool of shared computing resources within a cloudenvironment, with groups of shared computing resources being allocatedfor a particular job(s), user(s) and/or a purpose(s). The outer boundaryof the internal system 206 depicted in dashed lines, encompassingsubcomponents 216-230 (with applications 216 being depicted in lighterdashed lines to indicate that components may be included in internaland/or external systems), may represent a virtual private cloudallocated for hosting the entirety of the internal system 206.Additionally, the inner boundaries within internal system 206, alsodepicted in dashed lines, may indicate multiple virtual private clouds(e.g., subsets of the larger virtual private cloud encompassing theinternal system 206), each allocated for one or more particular tasks,users, or purposes (e.g., inventory integration services 224, inventorymanagement jobs 228, and data warehouse systems 230).

Devices 202 may communicate with internal system 206 through one or moreapplications for inventory management 216 comprising one or moreweb-based portals or user interfaces for operations, includingoperations for accessing systems for designating one or more articlesfor availability via one or more storefronts associated with one or morehosting entities 136 (e.g., one or more articles made available forselection on a storefront that offers the same or similar articles forpurchase and/or for rental via a subscription). Each portal may generateor present a graphical user interface on a display of one or moredevices 202. Applications for inventory integration 216 may include, forexample, an inventory content management system and/or an inventoryassignment portal. Entities 120, 136, 146 may use devices 202 to accessinternal system 206 to perform inventory management, inventory pooling(e.g., identifying one or more articles for availability for atransaction rental service via the storefront of another entity and/oranother service such as a subscription service), article valuation,and/or other tasks.

In addition to applications for inventory management 216, internalsystem 206 may include internal applications, such as one or moreweb-based user interfaces. These interfaces may include one or moremobile applications compatible with predetermined mobile deviceoperating systems, a software application developed for desktopoperating systems, and/or a web site configured for browser access toweb pages via one or more networks (e.g., the Internet or an intranet).Employees 114 may use devices employee devices (e.g., user devices 204)to access internal system 206 to perform additional tasks, such as CaaSfunctions related to warehouse operations and/or administrative tasks.

Internal system 206 may also include Application Programming Interface(“API”) endpoints 218, APP (application) endpoints 220, and loginendpoints 222. In some implementations, these endpoints may be hosted ina virtual private cloud or a physical private network. API endpoints 218may be locations from which the APIs can access resources of theinternal system 206 that the APIs need to carry out their functions. Forexample, the API endpoints 218 may specify where resources can beaccessed by the APIs, while communicating with the APIs requestinginformation from the internal system 206. APP endpoints 220 may be thelocations from which applications (e.g., applications for inventoryintegration 216, one or more internal applications) may access resourcesof the internal system 206 they need to carry out their functions, andthe login endpoints 222 may be the touchpoints of any communicationpertaining to logins (e.g., authentication and access control)associated with internal system 206. Login endpoints 222 may receive andprocess login communications for applications for inventory integration216 and/or external user facing applications 208. At least someendpoints among the API endpoints 218, APP endpoints 220, and loginendpoints 222, may be entity-branded endpoints, designated to serveparticular entities 120, 136, 146.

In some aspects, different interfaces or functionalities may beassociated with a role of each entity 120, 136, 146 (e.g., fulfillerentities 120, hosting entities 136, or others, such as an additionalentities 146), the role being determined based on login informationreceived via one or more of the API endpoints 218, APP endpoints 220,and login endpoints 222. Additionally or alternatively, separate APIendpoints 218, APP endpoints 220, and/or login endpoints 222 may beprovided for one or more particular roles.

Internal system 206 may include inventory integration services 224 thatfacilitate transaction rental systems or other pooled inventoryfunctions, as well as inventory integration data storage systems 226 forstoring information useful for operating, updating, and analyzing one ormore aspects of the article integration service. Inventory integrationservices 224 may include services, such as microservices, forfulfillment of various CaaS operations hosted in one or more virtualprivate clouds or one or more physical private networks, includingmicroservices that facilitate inventory integration for integratingarticles in one or more electronic storefronts for transaction rentalservices. Inventory services 224, which may include inventoryavailability and valuation services, may facilitate changes in articlesoffered for transaction rental services, changes in inventories based onarticles selected for a storefront associated with one or more hostingentities 136, and/or changes to valuation assigned to articles allocatedto an inventory, such as an inventory of articles available fortransaction rental services. In particular, one or more of thesemicroservices may be configured to support external storefrontintegration, inventory reservations, value assessment and assignment,article status monitoring, and user targeting, as described in moredetail below with respect to microservices 356 (FIG. 3). Additionalmicroservices of internal system 206 may include, for example, accountdata, data services, customer service functions, marketing functions,warehouse functions, and/or other supporting functions.

Inventory integration data stores or storage systems 226 may be one ormore databases that store both raw and processed data resulting fromoperations of inventory integration services 224, endpoints 218-222,external systems 212, and/or data and analytics systems 214. Inventoryintegration data storage systems 226 may store, for example, inventorydata indicative of articles that were or are currently offered fortransaction rental integration (e.g., articles selected by an entity forpresentation via storefront(s) of one or more other entities), currentlyand previously rented articles (e.g., articles rented via transactionrental services), current and historical article valuations, performanceof one or more pooled articles (e.g., a frequency or number of times oneor more pooled articles is selected by a user via transaction rentalservices), among others. The data stored in data storage systems 226 mayinclude transactional data, batch jobs data, searchable data includingvarious analytics and attributes, event messages, and local logs ofvarious raw data.

Internal system 206 may additionally include inventory management jobs228. Inventory management jobs 228 may be hosted in, for example, one ormore virtual private clouds. Inventory management jobs 228 may include,for example, system components that run and update data associated withinternal system 206 that are useful for pooled inventory and articlesharing. In particular, system components of inventory management jobs228 may be configured to receive and dynamically update data associatedwith articles that are offered for inventory sharing, currently sharedarticles, and/or articles that were previously shared and presented instorefront catalogs associated with (e.g., branded) one or more entities120, 136, 146. These system components may include, for example,components for identifying and storing historical data for each entityand each individual article or group of articles associated with one ormore identifiers, snapshot data indicative of a current or recent (e.g.,within 24 hours, within one week, etc.) status information of aplurality of articles, including articles included in one or more pooledinventories, articles that are currently available from a plurality ofentities 120, 136, 146 for selection (e.g., closeting, selection fortransaction rental, selection for expedited delivery via a subscriptionservice, etc.) by one or more users 108, and/or valuation dataassociated with the historical and/or snapshot data. Jobs 228 may alsoinclude system components useful for generating recommendationspresented by fulfiller/hosting entity devices 202. As an example, theserecommendations may be presented, via one or more fulfiller entitydevices 118, to recommend one or more articles to a fulfiller entity 120that are available for transaction rental integration, but not yetintegrated (e.g., not currently made available in a storefrontassociated with a hosting entity 136).

Jobs 228 may also include, for example, periodic data refreshoperations, periodic synchronization states among internal and externalservices, and automated tasks to run in the background at internalsystem 206, as described in more detail below with respect to jobexecution cluster 346 (FIG. 3). Additional jobs for internal system 206for supporting other aspects of a CaaS may include, for example, ETL(extract, transform, and load) processes that comprise collecting datafrom multiple different sources, converting the collected data to otherone or more preset formats as necessary, and loading the data into thetarget database(s) (e.g., data warehouse systems 230). Additional systemcomponents useful for jobs of environment 200 may include, for example,replenishment identifier (RID) generation service(s), size advisor dataset, size advisor algorithmic preparation component(s), recommendationservice(s) for generating recommendations to end users, search datasets, etc.

Internal system 206 may include file stores or databases that storesnapshots, which may include the above-described snapshot data.Snapshots may include information that represents a status, at aparticular moment or over a period of time, of information created,collected, and/or stored by architecture 200 and in particular, by datastorage systems 226. For example, snapshots associated with inventoryintegration systems may be stored in inventory data storage systems 226,which may be included in one or more virtual private clouds or one ormore physical private networks. Snapshots stored in systems 226 mayinclude data representative of a current status of pooled articles,including articles that are allocated for the article integrationservice. Other snapshots may capture states of other aspects of internalsystem 206 and may be stored in systems 226 or in one or more additionaldata stores. Additional snapshots may capture settings, files,configurations, and the memory state of the components of the internalsystem 206.

These snapshots may be restored upon request or scheduling, and when asnapshot is restored, settings, and/or the state of the internal system206 may be returned to the states they were in at the time the snapshotswere captured. Internal system 206 may include third party data ETLprocesses which may collect data from different external sources (e.g.,external systems 212), convert the collected data to other one or morepreset formats, and load the data into one or more target databases.

Internal system 206 may include the data warehouse systems 230 in one ormore virtual private clouds or one or more physical private networks. Asdiscussed above, data warehouse systems 230 may include one or moretarget databases for ETL processes that collect data from varioussources (e.g., external systems 212 or inventory exchange data storagesystems 226). Data warehouse systems 230 may then utilize the collecteddata as, for example, parameters for business intelligence that revealspatterns, analytics, and insights for implementing an articleintegration service. In particular, data warehouse systems 230 may storeinformation useful for performing analytics for the article integrationservice, such as identities and roles of entities engaged in theservice, articles currently offered in the integration service, articlesthat are currently shared (“pooled”) among two or more inventoryservices, etc. Analytics may be performed, based on information of datawarehouse systems 230, by components of internal system 206 (e.g.,inventory management jobs 228) and/or with one or more external systems212.

Analysis of information stored in data warehouse systems 230 may be usedfor one or more reporting tools useful for monitoring the performance ofone or more entities (fulfiller entities, hosting entities) and/or oneor more articles involved in the article integration service. Forexample, such analyses may be useful for the generation and presentationof information representative of performance analytics of one or morearticles offered for selection via the article integration service,performance analytics of one or more storefronts presenting articlesoffered for selection via the article integration service, performanceanalytics of a particular entity (e.g., performance of a fulfillerentity's inventory listed in a hosting entity's storefront), theperformance of one or more particular roles (e.g., a group of fulfiller,hosting, or other entities), etc.

With continued reference to FIG. 2, environment 200 may also includeuser devices 204, which may correspond to user devices 112 (FIG. 1).Users 108 of the CaaS electronic platform may use the user devices 204to access the internal system 206, as recipients of the servicesprovided by the components of the internal system 206 (e.g., aspotential users of transaction rental systems and/or as subscribingusers that receive articles offered as a service). For example, users108 of user devices 204 may be one or more registered subscribers whophysically receive and wear items that are distributed via the CaaSelectronic platform (e.g., subscribers of a service offered inconnection with a fulfiller entity 120). As shown in FIG. 2, userdevices 204 may access the internal system 206 via external user facingapplications 208. External user facing applications 208 may bebrowser-accessed web pages or web-based applications that includeweb-based user interfaces accessible from one or more user devices 204over one or more networks (e.g., one or more networks 101).

In some implementations, web application hosting server 210 acts as anintermediary for enabling communications made between devices 202 andinternal system 206, between employee devices and internal system 206,and between user devices 204 and internal system 206. Internal system206 may present different communications interfaces (e.g., applications)based on an identity supplied by devices 202 and 204, such as a tenantor other entity, employee, or user. In particular, internal system 206may further provide different communications interfaces based on aparticular role supplied by entity devices 202 (e.g., a rolecorresponding to fulfiller entities 120, hosting entities 136, oradditional or hybrid entities 146).

Web application hosting server 210 may be an external (e.g., thirdparty) server or internal (e.g., intranet, local network) server or hostthat provides an online platform for the article integration service.Web application hosting server 210 may host a platform for an articleintegration service that may be accessed by devices 202. Thisintegration service may provide a management interface (e.g., viainventory assignment portal 332, described below) for viewing,selecting, and modifying articles or groups of articles that areavailable for use in the integration service. These interfaces,supporting systems and processes (e.g., components of environment 200and/or server system 300), which are collectively or individuallyreferred to herein as a “inventory availability and valuation service,”may facilitate the ability of entities (e.g., a fulfiller entity 120),to provide one or more articles that are available for transactionrental in a storefront of another entity (e.g., a hosting entity 136).

When web application hosting server 210 communicates with user devices204 of one or more users 108 (e.g., subscribing and/or non-subscribingusers of a CaaS provider), web application hosting server 210 maypresent a web-based storefront interface integrating online retailcomponents (e.g., an online point-of-sale system) onto the storefrontinterface. Web application hosting server 210 may communicate with theinternal system 206 (e.g., the API endpoints 218, the APP endpoints 220,a device 202 or 204 logged into the internal system 206), to retrievenecessary information about the internal system 206, and to generate ordynamically update an interface for user devices 204 to interact withthe storefront, the storefront allowing user devices 204 to select oneor more articles as part of a subscription service, for a one-timepurchase, and/or for a transaction rental interaction.

Each of the interfaces accessed by devices 202 via applications forinventory sharing 216 may be dynamically-updated by web applicationhosting server 210. Applications 216 may allow entity devices 204 tocommunicate with internal system 206 and with one or more externalsystems 212 to facilitate the operation and update of the management andretailer storefront interfaces that are generated, at least in part,based on information provided by the article integration service.Information, including information for the inventory availability andvaluation service for inclusion in one or more retailer storefronts, maybe supplied via API access communication links 250 that enablecommunication with external systems 212.

II. B. Supporting System(s)

External systems 212 may be configured to perform data analytics orother tasks that support operations performed with inventoryavailability and valuation services 224 and/or inventory management jobs228. For example, external systems 212 may include one or more analyticssystem 236, payment systems 238, external storefront hosting systems240, and value setting systems 242.

Analytics systems 236 may include computing resources in communicationwith one or more components of internal system 206 to collect, store,and/or manage data and analytics associated with the one or moreentities 120, 136, 146. Analytics systems 236 may be located remotelyfrom the internal system 206 (e.g., at tenant servers, servers of otherentities, external cloud servers, etc.). Analytics systems 214 maycommunicate with the components of internal system 206 using API accessor file transfer link 250 over one or more networks 101. For example,analytics systems 214 may communicate with the API endpoints 218 ofinternal system 206, or receive files from third party data ETLprocesses. Data provided for analysis by analytics systems 236 mayinclude data stored in inventory integration data storage systems 226and/or data warehouse systems 230. Analytics systems 214 may be accessedby employee devices 202, which may correspond to employee devices 116 orentity devices 118, 132, 142 (FIG. 1). Analytics systems 236 may beaccessed by devices 202 to retrieve analytics data for businessintelligence (e.g., by identifying articles that perform well, asindicated by transaction rental selections, closeting selections, trythen buy selections, and/or purchase selections).

Payment systems 238 may facilitate payments from users to entities and,if desired, between entities, as part of the article integrationservice. Payment systems 238 may, for example, facilitate payments foran article selected for transaction rental by a user interacting with astorefront of a hosting entity 136, in a manner that facilitatesinvolvement of a fulfiller entity 120 and/or an additional entity 146,as described below. Payment systems 238 may provide a payment tool inthe form of a cloud-based platform configured to accept payments fromentities with a website or within the platform's mobile application.Payment systems 238 may generate invoices and/or reports based on arelationship between a plurality of entities. For example, for a pair ofentities including a fulfiller entity 120 and a hosting entity 136,payment systems 238 may be configured to review articles selected by auser for a transaction rental interaction and generate reports and/orinvoices by calculating an apportionment of funds that are distributedbetween these entities according to the result of a transaction rentallifecycle (e.g., initial fees, daily rental fees, purchase fees, etc.)for a particular article. Payment systems 238 may be accessed by devices202 to retrieve payments and view payment analytics data.

External storefront hosting systems 240 of external systems 212 mayinclude one or more entity-housed systems and/or cloud systems that hostwebsites, applications, etc., for presenting one or more storefronts forhosting entities 136, as described below with respect to FIG. 5.External storefront hosting systems 240 may facilitate hosting ofwebsites and/or applications that present a user interface that allowsone or more users interacting with user devices 204 to select one ormore articles for purchase. External storefront hosting systems 240 maybe in communication with one or more internal systems 206 via API access250 to share data associated with the articles offered via theelectronic storefront, and to allow inventory services 224 and inventorymanagement jobs 228 to manage inventory availability to determinewhether one or more articles (e.g., articles of a pooled inventory) areavailable for transaction rental integration with the externalstorefront. While external storefront hosting systems 240 may beincluded in external systems 212 (e.g., at tenant servers or otherentity servers), in some configurations of environment 200, externalstorefront hosting systems 240 may instead be implemented, eitherpartially or entirely, within internal system 206 (e.g., hosted withininternal system 206 and accessed via external user facing applications208).

Value setting systems 242 may include one or more interfaces and/oranalytics services that determine (set) a value associated with anarticle offered in, for example, storefront of a hosting entity 136provided via external storefront hosting system 240. Value settingsystems 242 may be in communication with internal system 206 (e.g.,inventory services 224, inventory management jobs 228) via API access250 to communicate one or more of an e-commerce price (e.g., a suggestedor original price, a current or real-time price) and an articleidentifier (e.g., a unique identifier, a SKU, or other informationindicative of article characteristics such as color, size, style,manufacturer, etc.).

Environment 200 may include data and analytics systems 214 configured toanalyze and present information relevant to an article integrationservice, or other aspects of environment 200. Data and analytics systems214 may include computing resources in communication with one or morecomponents of internal system 206 that collect, store, and/or managedata and analytics associated with the one or more entities 120, 136,146. One or more systems or components of data and analytics systems 214may be located remotely from the internal system 206. Data and analyticssystems 214 may communicate with one or more components of internalsystem 206 using API access or file transfer link 254 over one or morenetworks 101 (FIG. 1). For example, data and analytics systems 214 maycommunicate with API endpoints 218 of internal system 206, or receivefiles from third-party data ETL processes. Data and analytics systems214 may be accessed by devices 202, and, which may correspond to entitydevices 118, 132, 142 (FIG. 1), and, if desired, to employee devices116.

The number and arrangement of devices, components, and communicationnetworks shown in FIG. 2 are provided as an example. In practice, theremay be additional devices, components, and/or communication networks,fewer devices, components, and/or communication networks, differentdevices, components, and/or communication networks, or differentlyarranged devices, components, and/or communication networks than thoseshown in FIG. 2. Furthermore, two or more devices shown in FIG. 2 may beimplemented within a single device, or a single device shown in FIG. 2may be implemented as multiple, distributed devices. Additionally oralternatively, a set of devices (e.g., one or more devices) ofenvironment 200 may perform one or more functions described as beingperformed by another set of devices of environment 200.

III. Server System

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing the architecture of an exemplary serversystem 300 for facilitating an inventory availability and valuationservice, e.g., for providing one or more articles for selection viatransaction rental integration. Server system 300 may correspond toserver system 102 depicted in FIG. 1, and to internal system 206depicted in FIG. 2.

Server system 300 may be accessed by a plurality of entities havingdifferent roles, such as users 306 (e.g., non-subscribing users and/orsubscribing users of the CaaS electronic platform), hosting entities308, fulfiller entities 310, additional entities 312, and employees ofthe CaaS electronic platform, such as warehouse staff 314. Each of theseentities may access server system 300 via authentication and accesscontrol 302.

Users 306 may correspond to users 108 (FIG. 1). Users 306 may usecomputing devices (e.g., user devices 204) to access the server system300, as recipients of the CaaS electronic platform services provided bythe components of the server system 300. For example, users 306 may beone or more non-subscribing users (registered or un-registered) and/orregistered subscribing users who closet or otherwise select one or morearticles by reviewing storefront catalogs of one or more entities, andphysically receive and wear the apparel that are distributed via theCaaS operations. Users 306 may log in to, or otherwise interact with,server system 300 to initiate tasks associated with one or more CaaSoperations, such as, for example, account management, storefront catalogviewing, selecting one or more articles for rental transactions,closeting items, providing return notifications, etc.

Fulfiller entities 310 may correspond to fulfiller entities 120, whilehosting entities 308 may correspond to hosting entities 136. Additionalentities 312 may have characteristics of both a fulfiller entity 310 anda hosting entity 308. Thus, additional entities 312 may correspond toadditional entities 146, as well as to one or more fulfiller entities120 and/or hosting entities 136.

Fulfiller entities 310 may include entities whose physical inventory ofarticles is at least partially made available and offered via thearticle integration service. This physical inventory may include one ormore “pooled” inventories, or inventories that are provided for multipleservice types. For example, a pooled inventory supplied by a particularfulfiller entity 310 (or, if desired a CaaS operator or CaaS tenant) mayinclude one or more articles available for transaction rentals. One ormore of the articles available for transaction rentals may also beincluded as part of a subscription service of a CaaS, and, inparticular, a “real-time” inventory associated with the CaaS. Such aninventory may be available for selection by one or more CaaS users(e.g., to guarantee that an upcoming shipment provided as part of thesubscription service includes an expedited article). Thus, a “pooled”article may be made available to one or more users 306 as an articleavailable for expedited handling as part of a subscription service, andalso available for selection via a storefront of one or more hostingentities 308 for a transaction rental service that integrates articlesfrom a fulfiller entity 310, additional entity 312, etc., with astorefront of one or more hosting entities 308. While fulfiller entities310 may offer articles to subscribing users 306, if desired, one or morefulfiller entities 310 may provide articles via another entity (e.g.,hosting entities 308 and/or additional entities 312) without directlyoffering any articles to users 306.

Hosting entities 312 may include entities that provide a storefronthaving one or more articles listed for purchase and/or for subscribingusers. Hosting entities 312 may for example, provide articles forpurchase and may not have an existing system for transaction rentalservices. Thus, hosting entities 312 may employ the physical inventoryor inventories offered by fulfiller entities 310 and additional entities312 to provide one or more articles for transaction rental services, asdescribed below.

Additional entities 312 may act as both hosting entities 308 andfulfiller entities 310, depending on the role of the entity 312 in aparticular interaction. Thus, additional entities 312 may offer one ormore articles via an electronic storefront for purchase and/or as partof a subscription service, and may offer one or more articles fortransaction rentals on the storefront of another additional entity 312or a hosting entity 308 via an inventory availability and valuationservice.

Warehouse staff 314 may correspond to employees 114 and other users ofdevices 116, and may access a warehouse operation portal 340 or otherportals to support CaaS operations, as described below. Warehouse staff314 or other employees 114 may log in to server system 300 and, viawarehouse portal 340 or other portals may initiate, view, manage, enterdata in, or perform administrative tasks related to warehouse and otheroperations.

In order to control access to server system 300, entities 306-314 maycommunicate with authentication and access control component 302, whichmay grant access to the server system 300 only if the access-requestingentity is successfully authenticated based on the access controlconditions corresponding to the particular entity. Access controlconditions may be stored in a memory in communication with server system300, and may be applied to a particular entity based on variousentity-specific factors, such as, for example, the authorized role(s) ofeach entity, the device being used by each entity, the portal sought tobe accessed, and/or the geographic location of each entity.

External services 318 may be services associated with tenant-specificstorefronts (e.g., storefronts 322 associated with a tenant for offeringarticles as a service). Services 318 may provide, for example, customersupport services, marketing and advertisement services, contentmanagement systems for building and updating each tenant-specificstorefront, and analytics services for tracking and reporting theperformance of the tenant-specific storefronts.

External services 320 may include services that are configured for usewith inventory integration (e.g., inventory integrated by use ofinventory availability and valuation service 224) with one or more ofentities 308, 310, 312. These external services 320 may include, forexample, valuation services for hosting a storefront associated witharticle purchases (e.g., external storefront hosting systems 240),managing valuations of articles listed via the article integrationservice (e.g., value setting systems 242) and analytics services (e.g.,analytics services 236) for analyzing and reporting performance ofstorefronts and/or articles listed via the article integration service(e.g., analytics representative of the frequency with which articles areselected for transaction rental by users 306, average valuations ofthese articles, etc.).

Tenant storefront 322 may include storefronts be accessed by users 306for purchasing or closeting articles included in one or more storefrontcatalogs, and may include web-based user interfaces. In particular,tenant storefront 322 may include a different interface for each tenant,such as a storefront interface 324A unique to tenant A, a storefrontinterface 324B unique to tenant B, and a storefront interface 324Nunique to tenant N. Each tenant-specific interface may include a sharedcore 324 common to all tenants. Tenant storefront 322 may communicatewith other components of server system 300 (e.g., external services 318,per tenant catalog CMS 328, and/or microservices 356) using storefrontcombination API 326. Each tenant storefront 322 may present a pluralityof articles for purchasing, closeting and/or selection of articles byusers 306. These articles may include one or more articles that areprovided by an article integration service.

Tenants 308, 310, 312 may access per tenant catalog content managementsystem (CMS) 328. The per tenant catalog CMS 328 may comprise a portalthat includes one or more user interfaces for communicating withentities 308, 310, 312 to create, modify, and/or update one or morearticle catalogs for the tenant storefront 322 (e.g., catalogs of thestorefront interface 324A for tenant A). Per tenant catalog CMS 328 maybe in communication with external services 318. External services 318may include online storefront management services, includingsubcomponents, such as a storefront user interface building/updatingtool and a dashboard for managing sales operations as orders, payments,and/or shipping. Data maintained by one or more of the external services318 may also be communicated to the per tenant catalog CMS 328.Communication between the per tenant catalog CMS 328 and the externalservices 318 may be performed by, for example, storefront combinationAPI 326, and/or data exchange over the one or more networks 101.

Tenant storefront 322 may be accessed by users 306 for selectingarticles, and may include web-based user interfaces. In particular,tenant storefront 322 may include a different interface for each tenant,such as a storefront interface 324A unique to tenant A, a storefrontinterface 324B unique to tenant B, and a storefront interface 324Nunique to tenant N. Each tenant-specific interface may include a sharedcore 324 common to all tenants. Tenant storefront 322 may communicatewith other components of server system 300 (e.g., external services 318,per tenant catalog CMS 328, and/or microservices 356) using storefrontcombination API 326. Each tenant storefront 322 may present a pluralityof articles available for closeting. In some aspects, tenant storefront322 may correspond to storefronts for purchasing articles and/or forselecting articles, by users 306.

Entities 308, 310, 312 may access per tenant catalog content managementsystem (CMS) 328. The per tenant catalog CMS 328 may comprise a portalthat includes one or more user interfaces for communicating withentities 308, 310, 312 to create, modify, and/or update one or moreapparel catalogs for the tenant storefront 322 (e.g., storefrontcatalogs in the storefront interface 324A for tenant A as part of anarticle subscription service). Per tenant catalog CMS 328 may be incommunication with the external services 318. External services 318 mayinclude online storefront management services, including subcomponentssuch as a storefront user interface building/updating tool and adashboard for managing sales operations as orders, payments, and/orshipping. Data maintained by one or more of the external services 318may also be communicated to the per tenant catalog CMS 328.

Communication between per tenant catalog CMS 328 and external services318 may be performed by, for example, storefront combination API 326,and/or data exchange over the one or more networks 101.

Entities 308, 310, 312 may each access inventory assignment portal 332.Inventory assignment portal 332 may allow fulfiller entities 310 andadditional entities 312 to designate one or more articles that areavailable via the inventory availability and valuation service.Inventory assignment portal 332, or one or more separate portals, mayalso allow hosting entities 308 to browse articles designated byentities 310, 312, and to select one or more these articles fortransaction rental integration via an electronic storefront associatedwith the hosting entity 308.

At the server system 300, warehouse staff 314 may access a warehouseoperation portal 340. Warehouse staff 314 authorized for such access maybe one or more employees associated with warehouse operations of theCaaS electronic platform of the server system 300. Warehouse portal 340may include one or more user interfaces at which warehouse staff 314may, for example, initiate, view, manage, enter data in, or performadministrative tasks related to warehouse operations. The warehouseportal 340 may communicate with microservices 356, including, forexample, warehouse APIs 370. Warehouse APIs 370 may include servicecomponents that may communicate with the warehouse operation portal 340may include, for example, order processing, item photoshoot, inventory,inventory location, garment allocation, order fulfillment, shippinglabel management, package and shipment operations, return processing,laundry, and cycle count.

Warehouse APIs 370 may facilitate the management of physical inventoriesthat are located in one or more distribution centers, such that aparticular warehouse may include articles that are shared between aplurality of entities among entities 308, 310, 312. Warehouse APIs 370may facilitate the management of article allocation via one or moredatabases, for example. Data for a particular shared article that ismanaged via warehouse APIs 370 may identify each entity that is sharingthe article, the entity that supplied the article, and other data storedin data warehouse 390 (and in inventory allocation database 480, 620,described below).

Portals 332 and 340 may communicate with one or more components ofmicroservices 356, and/or external services 318, 320, via one or moresuitable APIs and/or over the one or more networks 101. Suitable APIsmay include, for example, APIs access communication links 250 and/or 254(FIG. 2). In at least some configurations, portals 332 and/or 340 maycorrespond to applications for inventory sharing 216, external systems212, or both (FIG. 2).

Within server system 300, a group of hosts (e.g., computing resources)may form a job execution cluster 344. Job execution cluster 344 mayutilize the combined computing power and shared resources of the hoststo process one or more jobs (e.g., workloads) of server system 300. Jobexecution cluster 344 may, for example, dynamically allocate thecombined computing power and the shared resources of the hosts, toperform one or more jobs associated with storefront, back office, andarticle integration tasks. For a plurality of different jobs, theallocation of the computing power and the resources may be prioritizedbased on predetermined criteria, such as, for example, criticality,cost, time/order of receipt, and/or urgency. Job execution cluster 344may be configured to execute inventory integration jobs 345, storefrontjobs 346, and back office jobs 348.

Inventory exchange jobs 345 may configure job execution cluster 344 toperform background tasks triggered by one or more actions of entities308, 310, 312 and/or actions of users 306. Actions of entities 308, 310,312 may trigger background tasks by an interaction with portal 332. Forexample, if a hosting entity 308 selects one or more articles offeredfor integration from a supplied inventory of a fulfiller entity 310(e.g., for inclusion in a transaction rental service integrated with anelectronic storefront of hosting entity 308), inventory integration jobs345 may perform tasks, such as initiating one or more microservices 356and calling one or more APIs corresponding to microservices 356. Actionsof users 306 that trigger inventory integration jobs 345 may includeviewing a storefront of a entity 308, 312, that is associated with aninventory availability and valuation service, and interacting with oneor more graphical elements associated with a particular article or groupof articles. As an example, a user 306 may view an article that isavailable for purchase on an externally-hosted storefront of a hostingentity 308. In response, inventory integration jobs 345 may performbackground tasks to determine whether a corresponding article isavailable via an article integration service, a correspondingtransaction rental value of the article, etc. These tasks may includecalling one or more APIs corresponding to microservices 356, includingAPIs associated with external storefront 358, inventory reservation 360,account 362, real-time (“RT”) valuation 364, status monitoring 366,and/or targeting 368. Additionally or alternatively, job executioncluster 344 may call one or more external service components of services320.

Storefront jobs 346 may configure job execution cluster 344 to performbackground tasks triggered by actions of users 306 at tenant storefront322 (e.g., a storefront of a CaaS for subscribing users associated withone or more entities 308, 310, 312), such as initiating an order for oneor more garments for shipment to a first user. In response to such anaction by a user 306, job execution cluster 344 may execute a series oftasks under storefront jobs 346, including initiating one or moremicroservices 356, including warehouse APIs 370. Inventory exchange jobs345 and storefront jobs 346 may be performed on demand at server system300, whenever tenant or user actions are received via portal 332 and/orvia tenant storefront(s) 322.

Back office jobs 348 may configure the job execution cluster 344 toperform tasks such as periodic data refresh 350, periodicsynchronization states 352, and automated background tasks 354. In someimplementations, back office jobs 348 may correspond to, or include,inventory management jobs 228 (FIG. 2). Job execution cluster 344 mayexecute jobs scheduled under periodic data refresh 350, in accordancewith one or more predetermined data refresh schedules. During eachiteration of a job under periodic data refresh 350, applicable variabledata (e.g., metrics, scores, recommendation outputs, prices, etc.)stored in databases associated with data warehouse 390 may be refreshedbased on the values of the input parameters captured at the time ofexecution. For example, periodic data refresh 350 may refresh the valuesand/or data associated with the article integration service, such asinventory allocation and/or assignment, article valuation, etc. Periodicdata refresh 350 may also refresh values and/or data associated withsubscribing user functions, such as matching and fulfillment operations,pricing, achievable service level (ASL) and item retirement, discoveryand recommendation, and other data science jobs.

Job execution cluster 344 may also execute one or more jobs scheduledunder periodic synchronization states 352. For example, a job underperiodic synchronization states 352 may synchronize states betweenmicroservices 356 and external states (e.g., external services 318 and320). Job execution cluster 344 may execute jobs scheduled underautomated background tasks 354, such as tasks triggered from portal 332based on actions of entities 308, 310, 312. A job under automatedbackground tasks 354 may also be generated in response to an action ofone or more employees such as warehouse staff 314 interacting withwarehouse operation portal 340.

Server system 300 may include microservices 356 that are available fordeployment, for example, via one or more APIs. Microservices 356 maycorrespond to inventory integration services 224 depicted in FIG. 2.Microservices 356 may be services hosted at the virtual private clouds,as shown in FIG. 2, and may include external storefront 358, inventoryreservation 360, account 362, RT valuation 364, status monitoring 366,targeting 368, and warehouse APIs 370. While individual microservices358-370 are shown in FIG. 3, as understood, one or more of thesemicroservices may be combined, or may be accomplished by one or moreadditional microservices.

External storefront 358 may facilitate communication between one or moreexternally-hosted storefronts associated with hosting entities 308and/or additional entities 312. External storefront 358 may beconfigured to communicate with, for example, an electronic commerce(e-commerce) storefront hosted externally of server system 300. Externalstorefront 358 may include service components, such as APIs, configuredto receive an article identifier associated with an internal or externalstorefront (e.g., an article viewed by a user 306 interacting with thestorefront). External storefront 358 may facilitate identification of anarticle associated with the article identifier, identification of anallocation of one or more physical articles available for transactionrental selection, and identification of a transaction rental valuationassociated with the article.

Inventory reservation 360 may be configured to initiate API calls toidentify and update a reservation status of specific article(s) that areidentified by via API calls initiated by external storefront 358.Reservation status of an article may include updating and/or reading aflag indicative of whether a particular physical article is availablefor transaction rentals. Inventory reservation 360 may be initiated whena user interacts with a storefront and thus initiates one or morecomponents of the inventory availability and valuation service, and maytemporarily reserve an article while a user completes a transactionrental interaction.

Account 362 may include service components such as, for example, newaccount creation, password login, social network login, password reset,single sign-on function(s), and/or session renewal function(s). Theseservice components may be activated by users 306 for accessingstorefronts 322, entities 308, 310, 312 for accessing per tenant catalogCMS 328, inventory assignment portal 332, or by warehouse staff 314 foraccessing warehouse operation portal 340. Account 362 may facilitateidentification of users 306 and may support identification of a usertype. For example, by authenticating a user 306, account 362 mayfacilitate identification of a user status or classification, such as anon-subscribing user, a subscribing user, a new user, etc.

RT valuation 364 services may include service components for assigningone or more of an initial transaction rental value, a daily transactionrental rate, a Try-Then-Buy price, a buy item price (e.g., a discountedTTB price), or other values associated with an article provided via theinventory availability and valuation service. These service componentsmay initiate communication with value setting systems 242 or, when valuesetting systems 242 are included in internal system 206, may includecomponents for calculating appropriate values for one or more articlesoffered via the inventory availability and valuation service.

Status monitoring 366 may include one or more service components fordetermining status of one or more articles offered via the inventoryavailability and valuation service. In particular, one or moremicroservices for status monitoring 366 may include service componentsfor monitoring status of articles that were selected via an theinventory availability and valuation service by users 306. Statusmonitoring service 366 may enable operations including, for example,monitoring a lifecycle status of an article that is in the possession ofa user 306 (e.g., data indicative of whether a particular physicalarticle is in an initial transaction rental period, a daily transactionrental period, etc.). Status monitoring service 366 may supportoperations for enabling users 306 to view current and previously-rentedarticles, costs associated with these rentals, and current status ofrented articles that were supplied by the inventory availability andvaluation service and/or by an article subscription service.

Targeting services 368 may include one or more service components thatretrieve (e.g., from account service 362) a user identifier or othercharacteristic associated with a user 306 interacting with an internalor external storefront. Targeting services 368 may be configured totransmit an instruction for generating a transaction rentalcall-to-action (CTA) based on an article identified via externalstorefront services 358 and/or the user 306 identified via externalstorefront services 358. For example, targeting services 368 may includeservice components for performing prioritization for determining whichusers of users 306 are presented with a transaction rental CTA based onthe identity and/or characteristic of these users 306, an identity of astorefront that a particular user 306 is interacting with, or othertargeting criteria, as described below.

Warehouse APIs 370 may include service components such as, for example,order processing, photoshoot (e.g., capturing electronic images ofarticles being made available for rental or purchase transactions),warehouse inventory (e.g., computer-implemented functions associatedwith inventory management of items to be rented or purchased), warehouselocation (e.g., locating item in a warehouse), fulfillment (e.g.,fulfilling initiated orders), shipping label (e.g., generating,modifying, or outputting shipping labels), package and shipment (e.g.,computer-implemented functions associated with packaging, sorting,and/or delivering the shipments out to users 306), return processing(e.g., processing return items that have been received at a warehouse),laundry (e.g., computer-implemented functions associated with performinglaundry of the returned items), and/or cycle count (e.g.,computer-implemented functions associated with counting cycles that eachwearable item have gone through).

Microservices 356 may be in communication with a plurality of databases,including, for example, databases included in data warehouse 390. Datawarehouse 390 may include one or more data repositories that aredynamically updated based on tenant interactions with per tenant catalogCMS 328, portals 332, 340, etc. Data warehouse 390 may also includedynamically updated data repositories that reflect interactions of users306 with one or more storefronts, including the interactions of users306 to select articles made available for transaction rental via thearticle integration service and/or articles provided for transactionrental via a pooled inventory of articles.

At server system 300, an ETL system (not shown) may extract, transform,and load various data outputs into data warehouse 390, so that datawarehouse 390 may serve as a unified source of data that are used forbusiness intelligence or business analytics, including analyticsindicative of the performance of the inventory availability andvaluation service. For example, the ETL system may collect data frommultiple different sources, convert the collected data to presetformats, and load the data into the data warehouse systems 390. In someimplementations, the data warehouse 390 may correspond to the datawarehouse systems 230 (FIG. 2).

As shown in FIG. 3, data warehouse 390 may be in communication with areport server 391. Report server 391 may be an external datavisualization engine which may be configured to collect data from datawarehouse 390 and generate reports focused on business intelligence andanalytics. Reports may be scheduled and/or automated with preconfiguredsettings (e.g., applicable time periods, input parameters, outputmetrics, output format, etc.), to produce reports 395. Additionally, oralternatively, ad hoc requests may be received from one or more entities308, 310, 312, such that report server 391 may respond to the ad hocrequests by generating and communicating reports 395. Reports 395 maypresent information indicative of a performance of aspects of theinventory availability and valuation service, including the performanceof articles or groups of articles, performance of storefront(s) thatpresent articles via the inventory availability and valuation service,or performance of one or more entities 308, 310, 312.

The number and arrangement of devices, components, and communicationnetworks shown in FIG. 3 are provided as an example. In practice, theremay be additional devices, components, and/or communication networks,fewer devices, components, and/or communication networks, differentdevices, components, and/or communication networks, or differentlyarranged devices, components, and/or communication networks than thoseshown in FIG. 3. Furthermore, two or more devices shown in FIG. 3 may beimplemented within a single device, or a single device shown in FIG. 3may be implemented as multiple, distributed devices. Additionally oralternatively, a set of devices (e.g., one or more devices) associatedwith server system 300 may perform one or more functions described asbeing performed by another set of devices associated with server system300.

IV. Exemplary Article Integration Service Implementations

FIG. 4A is a diagram illustrating an exemplary implementation ofenvironment 100, architecture 200, and/or server system 300 foroperating an article integration service 430 that, if desired, may beassociated with a CaaS platform. Implementation 400 is simplified andexemplary.

Implementation 400 may enable functionality that allows entities, suchas a plurality of hosting entities and a plurality of fulfillerentities, to integrate transaction rental features into independentstorefronts and to provide transaction rental functionality in a mannerthat reduces the amount of development and testing required to deploytransaction rental functions. As shown in FIG. 4A, one or more articles404 of an inventory 402 associated with a fulfiller entity 420 (whichmay correspond to entities 120, 146, 310, 312), may be integrated viainventory availability and valuation service 430 with a storefront of ahosting entity 410 (which may correspond to entities 136, 146, 308,312).

In the exemplary implementation 400, a fulfiller entity 420 (having anexemplary entity ID 0587) may be associated with an inventory 402 thatincludes a plurality of articles 404 that were supplied (e.g.,manufactured or purchased and transferred to a warehouse, such as awarehouse associated with a CaaS operator, for distribution to one ormore users 416). Articles 404 of inventory 402 may include one or morearticles that have been used in one or more previous usage cycles. Forexample, articles 404 may include articles that have been previouslyshipped to, and returned by, one or more users 416. Users 416 maycorrespond to users 108, 306, and may include subscribing usersassociated with a tenant of the CaaS and/or subscribing users of one ormore fulfiller entities 420.

A hosting entity 410 (having an exemplary entity ID 1678) may beassociated with an inventory 452 that includes a plurality of articles454, each of the articles 454 being included in a physical inventorythat is made available for users 418 via an electronic storefront ofhosting entity 410 (e.g., an external storefront for purchasing articles454). These articles 454 may each be excluded from a subscriptionservice and/or from a transaction rental service or other service(s) fortemporary use of articles 454. Users 418 may correspond to users 108,306, and include one or more subscribing users associated with a CaaS.In particular, one or more users 418 may be a subscribing userassociated with a subscription service of tenant and/or a fulfillerentity 420.

In some embodiments, one or more hosting entities 410 (an exemplaryentity 410 having an entity ID 9342 in FIG. 4A) may offer articlessolely from other entities, without the need to acquire or supply aphysical inventory. For example, a hosting entity 410 may offer articlesfrom one or more fulfiller entities 420 (one such entity 410 being shownin FIG. 4A). These hosting entities 410 may act as aggregators thatoffer articles for sale and for transaction rentals without physicallyproviding articles to the CaaS. As aggregators, such entities 410 mayoffer articles physically supplied by a plurality of different fulfillerentities 420. If desired, such hosting entities 410 may be associatedwith one or more storefronts that are constituted entirely by articlesfrom other entities. These articles may include solely articlesavailable for transaction rentals, if desired.

An allocation database 480 may include data sets for allocating articlesof inventories 402, 452. Allocation database 480 may enable theoperation of article integration service 430 through real-timemanagement of article reservations, as described below. Informationcorresponding to each inventory 402, 452 may be created, stored, anddynamically updated in one or more inventory allocation databases 480,which may correspond to one or more databases associated with datawarehouse 390, data warehouse systems 230, and/or databases 106.

Inventory availability and valuation service 430 may enable a user 418interacting with a hosting entity 410 to select an article 404 that issupplied by fulfiller entity. Inventory availability and valuationservice 430 may be configured to integrate at least a part of inventory402 of fulfiller entity 420 with a storefront of hosting entity 410. Inparticular, service 430 may enable one or more articles 404 thatcorrespond to (e.g., share a SKU, color, size, and/or style) an articleof inventory 452 to be offered as part of transaction rental serviceenabled in a storefront of a hosting entity 410 by inventoryavailability and valuation service 430. Thus, one or more articles 404supplied by fulfiller entity 420 may be included in articles 492 of aphysical shipment 490 physically shipped based on a user's interactionwith the storefront of hosting entity 410. In some aspects, each ofarticles 404 and 454 may be located in the same physical location (e.g.,a single logistics center or warehouse). However, if desired, one ormore of articles 404 and 454 may be present at different physicallocations, such as warehouses, before these articles are supplied to auser.

FIG. 4B is a diagram illustrating an exemplary transaction rentalsequence. As shown in FIG. 4B, as a first Step 440, a transaction rentalCTA (e.g., transaction rental CTA 524 shown in FIG. 5 and describedbelow) may be presented on a storefront of a hosting entity. This mayinclude enabling inventory availability and valuation service 430 in astep 468. In particular, this CTA may be presented when an articleviewed on the hosting entity storefront matches a corresponding article460 associated with a fulfiller tenant, this corresponding article 460of the fulfiller tenant being available for a transaction rentalservice. A user may select CTA 524 and complete a transaction rentalprocess (e.g., by interacting with an electronic interface associatedwith the fulfiller entity).

A step 444 may include shipping or otherwise dispatching the article tothe user. This may be performed by packing 462 the requested article byitself or with one or more additional articles. Once the requestedarticle is delivered to the user's requested destination, the user mayexperience the article 464 for a period of time. If desired by the user,the article 464 may be purchased. When the article is not purchased andis returned 466, the returned article 466 may be received by thefulfiller tenant (or an associated CaaS operator) and may be processed(e.g., inspected, cleaned, and transferred to a storage location). Thismay replenish the article, allowing an update to the availability of thereplenished article 460.

V. Exemplary Article Integration Service Implementations

FIG. 5 is a diagram illustrating an exemplary storefront environment 500implemented via environment 100, architecture 200, and/or server system300. Environment 500 may include one or more graphical elements that arepresented via user device 112. These graphical elements may, forexample, allow a user to interact with an electronic storefront, such asa storefront of a hosting entity 410.

A user interacting with an electronic storefront may be presented with aplurality of articles as graphical elements, such as an article image510. Additional article information may be presented via articledescription 512. The article description may include informationassociated with article image 510, such as style information, an articlename, a manufacturer, etc. Environment 500 may also include values 514,516 (e.g., values indicative of a purchase price of article 510),category (e.g., style) selectors 518, characteristic selectors 520,purchase call-to-action (CTA) 522, transaction rental CTA 524, andtransaction rental value 526.

One or more values 514, 516, associated with article 510 may be accessedin real time (e.g., when environment 500 is generated, e.g., in responseto an a user making an initial selection of article 510 from astorefront presenting a plurality of articles). For example, RTvaluation 364 microservice (FIG. 3) may be initiated to retrieve value514 and/or value 516 via an API (e.g., API access 250) in communicationwith one or more systems (e.g., external services 318, externalstorefront hosting systems 240) that host the electronic storefrontassociated with environment 500. A value 514 may correspond to aninitial value set by hosting entity 410, a recommended value associatedwith article 510, or similar value assigned to article 510 when article510 is initially offered. A value 516 may be a current value that is seton demand by hosting entity 410. Value 514, value 516, or both, may beset with value setting systems 242 such that RT valuation 364 isconfigured to retrieve an updated value as necessary in real-time ornear-time. RT valuation 364 may retrieve one or both values 514, 516 byinitiating an API call to communicate with an external system. In someconfigurations, RT valuation 364 may be initiated periodically (e.g.,hourly, daily, weekly, etc.), instead of retrieving value 514, 516 inreal-time.

A user may, by interacting with environment 500, select a desiredarticle category by changing the selected category selectors 518 and adesired article characteristic (e.g., size) by changing the selectedcharacteristic selector 520. Purchase call-to-action (CTA) 522 may allowa user to begin a process for purchasing article 510 according to theselected category and characteristic.

Transaction rental CTA 524 may be a dynamically-generated graphicalelement implemented via microservices 356, and may be generatedaccording to actions (e.g., API calls) or other service components ofexternal storefront 358, inventory reservation 360, account 362, RTvaluation 364, and/or targeting services 368. Transaction rental CTA 524may be generated by taking a plurality of factors into account,including an identity of the user interacting with environment 500(e.g., as determined via account 362), an availability of an article ina pooled inventory determined via inventory reservation 360, a valuationdetermined via RT valuation 364, and a desired subset of users that areeligible for transaction rental services determined via targetingservices 368. An API, such as external storefront 358 may causetransaction rental CTA 524 to be included in environment 500. Inresponse to a change initiated by an interaction with one or both of acategory selector 518 and characteristic selector 520, inventoryreservation 360 may be initiated to determine whether a fulfiller'sinventory (e.g., inventory 402) includes an available article thatmatches the newly-updated category and characteristic. Thus, transactionrental CTA 524 may be updated in real-time or near real-time, and may beomitted from environment 500 when no article is available that matchesthe updated category and/or characteristic.

Account 362 may facilitate an identification or category of the userinteracting with environment 500. This identity may be compared to adesired or targeted category of users via targeting services 368. Forexample, Transaction rental CTA 524 may be presented with the identifieduser is a subscribing user associated with a CaaS. In addition to usershaving a desired subscription status, categories of users that may betargeted for a transaction rental CTA 524 may include, first-time usersand/or new users (e.g., a user that created an account and/or joined asubscription service within a predetermined period of time such as onemonth, two months, three months, six months, one year, etc.). Targetedusers may include, for example, users associated with a CaaS (e.g., asubscribing user) that does not have a subscription with the hostingentity and fulfilling entity associated with a particular transactionrental interaction, prior users of a transaction rental service, etc.Users may be targeted based on the value of previously-rented articles.For example, targeted users may include users that rented at least onearticle having a value equivalent to, or below, a particular value,users that rented at least one article having a value equivalent to, orabove, a particular value, users whose cumulative activity is less thana particular activity level (e.g., a particular cumulative spend, aparticular cumulative number of articles and/or transaction rentalinteractions), and/or users whose cumulative activity is greater than aparticular activity level.

An transaction rental value 526 may be presented in environment 500together with transaction rental integration transaction rental 524.Transaction rental value 526 may indicate a value associated withinitiating a one-time rental of article 510. In some aspects,transaction rental value 526 may be generated, in real time, based onthe value(s) identified with RT valuation 364. In one example, RTvaluation 364 may extract one or both values corresponding to values514, 516, and determine a numerical value 526 as a function of values514 and/or 516. For example, value 526 may be determined by retrieving acurrent valuation of article 510 via RT valuation 364, and generating avalue presented as transaction rental value 526 as a percentage of theretrieved current valuation. In addition to presenting a transactionrental CTA 524 based on these or other characteristics of the user,targeting services 368 may modify value 526 based on the same or similarcriteria as discussed above for targeting transaction rental CTA 524.For example, a targeted user may be offered a discounted price toencourage users with relatively low activity to engage in thetransaction rental service and/or to reward high-volume or high-valuecustomers.

VI. Storage System Configuration

FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating an exemplary storage system forinformation stored in an allocation database 620, which may correspondto one or more of allocation database 480, data warehouse 390, or datawarehouse systems 230. Inventory allocation database 620 may storeinformation 600 in one or more data stores representative of inventoryallocation information for one or more articles. In particular,information 600 may include unique article identifier (“AID”) data 602that identifies a group of articles having the same characteristics(e.g., articles having the same SKU), unique entity identifier (“EID”)data, and data representative of an inventory that each article isallocated to, as allocation data 604 (an example of an assignedcategory). Information 600 may further include permission information606, 608, 610 (e.g., in the form of binary flags) indicative of whetheran article is permitted for distribution on behalf of one or morerespective hosting entities (e.g., HE1, HE2) and/or fulfiller entities(e.g., FE1). Real-time availability (“RTA”) data 612 of information 600stored in allocation database(s) 620 may indicate whether a particularphysical article is available (e.g., located at a warehouse and notcurrently in possession of a user) for shipment to the user interactingwith environment 500 (FIG. 5). Related article ID (“RAID”) data 614 mayindicate one or more articles that are related to another article.Articles identified in RAID data 614 may provide a substitute articlethat is presented (e.g., displayed in environment 500) to offer adifferent article for a transaction rental when the currently-viewedarticle is not associated with any item currently in a RT inventory, asdescribed below.

Each unique AID stored in data 602 may correspond to a particulararticle or group of articles that are substantially identical (e.g.,articles that share the same SKU, color, size, style, manufacturer,etc.). Each individual article or group of articles may be assigned orotherwise allocated to an inventory group. As an example, one or morearticles may be allocated to a real-time availability or “RT” inventory.Articles in the RT inventory (indicated by the flag “RT” in FIG. 6), maybe available for transaction rentals. These articles may be availablefor one or more services in addition to a transaction rental service.For example, articles in the RT inventory pool may be available for oneor more subscribing users as part of a subscription service. Inparticular, articles in the RT inventory pool may be available for afirst service, the transaction rental service, as well as a secondservice, such as an expedition service of a CaaS offered for subscribingusers to enable these users to select one or more articles for expeditedprocessing and handling. Articles that are not allocated to the RTinventory pool may be reserved for use solely in a particular service,such as one or more subscription services. This reserved status isindicated by a reserved flag represented by “RES” in FIG. 6.

Information 600 may include data indicative of associations betweenarticle identifiers 602 and specific entities. This data may indicatewhen each article can be included as an inventory of a respectiveentity. Thus, “Y” entries represent an article that is permitted to beincluded in a storefront of the corresponding entity, while “N” entriesrepresent articles that are not permitted for inclusion in a storefrontof the corresponding entity or otherwise unavailable.

Real-time availability (“RTA”) data 612 may be indicative of a currentavailability of a particular article for transaction rentals. RTA data612 may be retrieved and updated, for example, by inventory availabilityand valuation service 430 in response to user interactions inenvironment 500. RTA data 612 may be retrieved in response to a userviewing one or more articles presented in environment 500, a user'sselection of one or more articles presented in environment 500, or otherinteractions. RTA data 612 may be updated, for example, in response to auser's interaction with transaction rental CTA 524. When a userinteracts with (e.g., selects) transaction rental CTA 524, one or moremicroservices may update RTA data 612. In particular, when a userselects transaction rental CTA 524, an API, such as an API or otherservice component of inventory reservation 360 (FIG. 3), may update RTAdata 612 to reserve a particular article identified in AID data 602while a user interacts with environment 500. For example, an articlethat is initially indicated as being available (“Y”) in RTA data 612 maybe marked as unavailable (“N”) in RTA data 612. When a user completes aprocess for selecting the article for shipment (e.g., as a part of atransaction rental), inventory reservation 360 may be marked asunavailable until the article is received and processed by a CaaSprovider following use of the article by the user.

When an article that corresponds to a currently-viewed article (e.g.,article 510) is not available, RAID data 614 may be accessed todetermine whether one or more similar articles are available. Thesimilar articles may have one or more shared characteristics witharticle 510, such as a shared color, style, size, manufacturer, etc.When a viewed article (e.g., an article associated with AID 1234-WTE-4)is indicated as being unavailable in RTA data 612, a transaction rentalCTA may be presented for a related article (e.g., with informationcorresponding to articles of AID 2050-PTN-5 in the example shown in FIG.6).

VIII. Exemplary Method for Managing Electronic Inventory Data

FIG. 7 is a flowchart showing an exemplary method 700 for managing dataassociated with wearable articles, according to one or more embodiments.Prior to the below-described steps, method 700 may include physicallyreceiving one or more articles in a warehouse or logistics center fromone or more entities, such as a fulfiller entity. These articles may beprocessed, cleaned (if necessary), and stored so as to be available forshipment to one or more subscribing users. One or more of these articlesmay be provided for temporary use by one or more users, returned,processed (e.g., inspected, cleaned, and stored) before again being madeavailable as part of an inventory available for transaction rentals, aspart of one or more pooled inventories for example.

As shown in the exemplary method 700, a server system (e.g., serversystem 102 or server system 300) may receive wearable article data fromone or more electronic interfaces (e.g., via tenant catalog CMS 328,inventory assignment portal 332, and/or or applications for inventorymanagement 216). This wearable item data may describe one or morewearable items, and/or other articles, made available for physicalshipment to users via electronic transactions, wherein the one or moreelectronic interfaces are accessible from one or more devices (e.g.,entity devices 118, 132, 142 or employee devices 116) over one or morenetworks (Step 702). The wearable item data may describe one or morewearable items, and/or other articles, that are available via aninventory availability and valuation service 430. The inventoryavailability and valuation service 430 may allow one or more tenants tomake use of articles from other entities for inclusion in transactionrental offerings.

Additionally, the server system (e.g., the server system 102 or theserver system 300) may host one or more electronic interfaces (e.g.,applications for inventory management 216 and/or inventory assignmentportal 332), the inventory assignment portal 332 being responsive toactions performed with the electronic interfaces. The server system maybe configured to, in response to these actions, create, modify, ordelete article data (e.g., inventory data included in databases 106,inventory integration data storage systems 226, data warehouse systems230, data warehouse 390, allocation database 480, and/or allocationdatabase 620) for integrating one or more articles across a plurality ofstorefronts.

The server system (e.g., the server system 102 or the server system 300)may assign a category to articles described in the article data. Thearticle category may be one of a plurality of categories that correspondto service(s) for offering and distributing physical articles describedin the article data. For example, a first category may indicate thatcorresponding articles are available for selection by a first pluralityof users (e.g., articles available for purchase in a first storefront).An exemplary second category may be assigned to articles to indicatethat these articles are available for selection by a second plurality ofusers (e.g., articles available as part of a subscription service thatis limited to subscribing users) (Step 704).

The server system may monitor availability data for one or more wearablearticles included in the article data (e.g., availability data includedin databases 106, inventory integration data storage systems 226, datawarehouse systems 230, data warehouse 390, allocation database 480,and/or allocation database 620). Availability data (e.g., RTA data 612)may indicate whether one or more articles is available for selection viaa first electronic storefront (e.g., a storefront associated with afirst entity), a second electronic storefront (e.g., a storefrontassociated with a second entity), or both (Step 706). The availabilitydata may be dynamically updated (e.g., in real time) according toselections made by a user interacting with the first electronicstorefront, the second electronic storefront, or an additionalstorefront.

The server system (e.g., the server system 102 or the server system 300)may initiate one or more services (e.g., microservices 356) tofacilitate physical shipment of the first article (Step 708). Thisarticle may be one or more articles that were supplied to a logisticscenter or warehouse by a second entity (e.g., a fulfiller entity 120,310, 420), and may be selected by a user interacting with the firstelectronic storefront associated with a first entity (e.g., a hostingentity 136, 308, 410).

Although FIG. 7 shows example blocks of an exemplary method 700, in someimplementations, the exemplary method 700 may include additional blocks,fewer blocks, different blocks, or differently arranged blocks thanthose depicted in FIG. 7. Additionally, or alternatively, two or more ofthe blocks of the exemplary method 700 may be performed in parallel.

FIG. 8 depicts an exemplary computer device or system, in whichembodiments of the present disclosure, or portions thereof, may beimplemented. In some implementations, server system 102, user devices112, employee devices 116, entity devices 118, 132, and/or 142, entitydevices 202, user devices 204, internal system 206, external systems212, server system 300, and/or any other computer system or userterminal for performing the various embodiments of the presentdisclosure, may correspond to device 800. Additionally, each of theexemplary computer servers, databases, user interfaces, modules, andmethods described above with respect to FIGS. 1-7 can be implemented indevice 800 using hardware, software, firmware, tangible computerreadable media having instructions stored thereon, or a combinationthereof and may be implemented in one or more computer systems or otherprocessing systems. Hardware, software, or any combination of such mayimplement each of the exemplary systems, user interfaces, and methodsdescribed above with respect to FIGS. 1-7.

If programmable logic is used, such logic may execute on a commerciallyavailable processing platform or a special purpose device. One ofordinary skill in the art may appreciate that embodiments of thedisclosed subject matter can be practiced with various computer systemconfigurations, including multi-core multiprocessor systems,minicomputers, mainframe computers, computer linked or clustered withdistributed functions, as well as pervasive or miniature computers thatmay be embedded into virtually any device.

For instance, at least one processor device and a memory may be used toimplement the above-described embodiments. A processor device may be asingle processor, a plurality of processors, or combinations thereof.Processor devices may have one or more processor “cores.”

Various embodiments of the present disclosure, as described above in theexamples of FIGS. 1-7, may be implemented using a processor device 800.After reading this description, it will become apparent to a personskilled in the relevant art how to implement embodiments of the presentdisclosure using other computer systems and/or computer architectures.Although operations may be described as a sequential process, some ofthe operations may in fact be performed in parallel, concurrently,and/or in a distributed environment, and with program code storedlocally or remotely for access by single or multi-processor machines. Inaddition, in some embodiments the order of operations may be rearrangedwithout departing from the spirit of the disclosed subject matter.

As shown in FIG. 8, a device 800 used for performing the variousembodiments of the present disclosure (e.g., server system 102, userdevices 112, employee devices 116, entity devices 118, 132, 142, entitydevices 202, user devices 204, the internal system 206, the externalsystem(s) 212, server system 300, and/or any other computer system oruser terminal for performing the various embodiments of the presentdisclosure) may include a central processing unit (CPU) 820. CPU 820 maybe any type of processor device including, for example, any type ofspecial purpose or a general-purpose microprocessor device. As will beappreciated by persons skilled in the relevant art, CPU 820 also may bea single processor in a multi-core/multiprocessor system, such systemoperating alone, or in a cluster of computing devices operating in acluster or server farm. CPU 820 may be connected to a data communicationinfrastructure 810, for example, a bus, message queue, network, ormulti-core message-passing scheme.

A device 800 (e.g., server system 102, user devices 112, employeedevices 116, entity devices 118, 132, 142, entity devices 202, userdevices 204, internal system 206, external system(s) 212, server system300, and/or any other computer system or user terminal for performingthe various embodiments of the present disclosure) may also include amain memory 840, for example, random access memory (RAM), and may alsoinclude a secondary memory 830. Secondary memory, e.g., a read-onlymemory (ROM), may be, for example, a hard disk drive or a removablestorage drive. Such a removable storage drive may comprise, for example,a floppy disk drive, a magnetic tape drive, an optical disk drive, aflash memory, or the like. The removable storage drive in this examplereads from and/or writes to a removable storage unit in a well-knownmanner. The removable storage unit may comprise a floppy disk, magnetictape, optical disk, etc., which is read by and written to by theremovable storage drive. As will be appreciated by persons skilled inthe relevant art, such a removable storage unit generally includes acomputer usable (e.g., computer-readable) storage medium having storedtherein computer software and/or data (e.g., instructions).

In alternative implementations, secondary memory 830 may include othersimilar means for allowing computer programs or other instructions to beloaded into device 800. Examples of such means may include a programcartridge and cartridge interface (such as that found in video gamedevices), a removable memory chip (such as an EPROM, or PROM) andassociated socket, and other removable storage units and interfaces,which allow software and data to be transferred from a removable storageunit to device 800.

A device 800 may also include a communications interface (“COM”) 860.Communications interface 860 allows software and data to be transferredbetween device 800 and external devices. Communications interface 860may include a modem, a network interface (such as an Ethernet card), acommunications port, a PCMCIA slot and card, or the like. Software anddata transferred via communications interface may be in the form ofsignals, which may be electronic, electromagnetic, optical, or othersignals capable of being received by communications interface 860. Thesesignals may be provided to communications interface 860 via acommunications path of device 800, which may be implemented using, forexample, wire or cable, fiber optics, a phone line, a cellular phonelink, an RF link or other communications channels.

The hardware elements, operating systems and programming languages ofsuch equipment are conventional in nature, and it is presumed that thoseskilled in the art are adequately familiar therewith. A device 800 alsomay include input and output ports 850 to connect with input and outputdevices such as keyboards, mice, touchscreens, monitors, displays, etc.Of course, the various server functions may be implemented in adistributed fashion on a number of similar platforms, to distribute theprocessing load. Alternatively, the servers may be implemented byappropriate programming of one computer hardware platform.

The systems, apparatuses, devices, and methods disclosed herein aredescribed in detail by way of examples and with reference to thefigures. The examples discussed herein are examples only and areprovided to assist in the explanation of the apparatuses, devices,systems, and methods described herein. None of the features orcomponents shown in the drawings or discussed below should be taken asmandatory for any specific implementation of any of these theapparatuses, devices, systems, or methods unless specifically designatedas mandatory. For ease of reading and clarity, certain components,modules, or methods may be described solely in connection with aspecific figure. In this disclosure, any identification of specifictechniques, arrangements, etc. are either related to a specific examplepresented or are merely a general description of such a technique,arrangement, etc. Identifications of specific details or examples arenot intended to be, and should not be, construed as mandatory orlimiting unless specifically designated as such. Any failure tospecifically describe a combination or sub-combination of componentsshould not be understood as an indication that any combination orsub-combination is not possible. It will be appreciated thatmodifications to disclosed and described examples, arrangements,configurations, components, elements, apparatuses, devices, systems,methods, etc. can be made and may be desired for a specific application.Also, for any methods described, regardless of whether the method isdescribed in conjunction with a flow diagram, it should be understoodthat unless otherwise specified or required by context, any explicit orimplicit ordering of steps performed in the execution of a method doesnot imply that those steps must be performed in the order presented butinstead may be performed in a different order or in parallel.

Throughout this disclosure, references to components or modulesgenerally refer to items that logically can be grouped together toperform a function or group of related functions. Like referencenumerals are generally intended to refer to the same or similarcomponents. Components and modules can be implemented in software,hardware, or a combination of software and hardware. The term “software”is used expansively to include not only executable code, for examplemachine-executable or machine-interpretable instructions, but also datastructures, data stores and computing instructions stored in anysuitable electronic format, including firmware, and embedded software.The terms “information” and “data” are used expansively and includes awide variety of electronic information, including executable code;content such as text, video data, and audio data, among others; andvarious codes or flags. The terms “information,” “data,” and “content”are sometimes used interchangeably when permitted by context.

It is intended that the specification and examples be considered asexemplary only, with a true scope and spirit of the disclosure beingindicated by the following claims.

1-20. (canceled)
 21. A computer-implemented method for managing dataassociated with electronic inventory management of wearable articles,the method comprising: receiving, by one or more processors, at leastone user interaction with an electronic storefront of a hosting entitydisplayed on a user device, the at least one user interaction includinga selection of a category selector or a characteristic selector;determining, by the one or more processors, at least one availablearticle corresponding to the category selector or the characteristicselector; in response to determining the at least one available article,calling, by the one or more processors, one or more APIs correspondingto one or more microservices, the one or more microservices includingone or more targeting microservices; performing, by the one or moreprocessors, a prioritization by the one or more targeting microservicesto determine at least one transaction rental call-to-action for the atleast one available article based on a user identifier or at least onecategory of a user; displaying, by the one or more processors, the atleast one transaction rental call-to-action on the electronic storefrontof the hosting entity; and in response to receiving a user selection ofthe at least one transaction rental call-to-action, completing, by theone or more processors, a rental transaction corresponding to the atleast one available article.
 22. The computer-implemented method ofclaim 21, the at least one user interaction including a selection of oneor more articles of a fulfiller entity or a viewing of the electronicstorefront of the hosting entity.
 23. The computer-implemented method ofclaim 21, the at least one transaction rental call-to-action including adynamically-generated graphical element implemented via the one or moremicroservices.
 24. The computer-implemented method of claim 21, themethod further comprising: receiving, by the one or more processors, achange to the category selector or the characteristic selector via atleast one additional user interaction; determining, by the one or moreprocessors, at least one updated available article that matches thecategory selector or the characteristic selector; and updating, by theone or more processors, the at least one transaction rentalcall-to-action based on the at least one updated available article. 25.The computer-implemented method of claim 21, the completing the rentaltransaction including updating real-time availability data to reservethe at least one available article identified by unique articleidentifier data.
 26. The computer-implemented method of claim 21, the atleast one category of the user including at least one of one or moreusers with a desired subscription status, one or more first-time users,one or more subscribing users without a subscription with the hostingentity, one or more prior users of a transaction rental service, one ormore targeted users targeted based on a value of at least one previouslyrented article, one or more low activity users with activity below athreshold activity level, or one or more high activity users withactivity greater than the threshold activity level.
 27. Thecomputer-implemented method of claim 21, the method further comprising:determining, by the one or more processors, at least one transactionrental value corresponding to the at least one transaction rentalcall-to-action; and displaying, by the one or more processors, the atleast one transaction rental value on the storefront of the hostingentity.
 28. The computer-implemented method of claim 27, the methodfurther comprising: modifying, by the one or more processors, the atleast one transaction rental value based on whether the user is a lowactivity user, a high-volume user, or a high-value user.
 29. A computersystem for managing data associated with electronic inventory managementof wearable articles, the computer system comprising: a memory havingprocessor-readable instructions stored therein; and one or moreprocessors configured to access the memory and execute theprocessor-readable instructions, which when executed by the one or moreprocessors configures the one or more processors to perform a pluralityof functions, including functions for: receiving, by the one or moreprocessors, at least one user interaction with an electronic storefrontof a hosting entity displayed on a user device, the at least one userinteraction including a selection of a category selector or acharacteristic selector; determining, by the one or more processors, atleast one available article corresponding to the category selector orthe characteristic selector; in response to determining the at least oneavailable article, calling, by the one or more processors, one or moreAPIs corresponding to one or more microservices, the one or moremicroservices including one or more targeting microservices; performing,by the one or more processors, a prioritization by the one or moretargeting microservices to determine at least one transaction rentalcall-to-action for the at least one available article based on a useridentifier or at least one category of a user; displaying, by the one ormore processors, the at least one transaction rental call-to-action onthe electronic storefront of the hosting entity; and in response toreceiving a user selection of the at least one transaction rentalcall-to-action, completing, by the one or more processors, a rentaltransaction corresponding to the at least one available article.
 30. Thecomputer system of claim 29, the at least one user interaction includinga selection of one or more articles of a fulfiller entity or a viewingof the electronic storefront of the hosting entity.
 31. The computersystem of claim 29, the at least one transaction rental call-to-actionincluding a dynamically-generated graphical element implemented via theone or more microservices.
 32. The computer system of claim 29, thefunctions further comprising: receiving, by the one or more processors,a change to the category selector or the characteristic selector via atleast one additional user interaction; determining, by the one or moreprocessors, at least one updated available article that matches thecategory selector or the characteristic selector; and updating, by theone or more processors, the at least one transaction rentalcall-to-action based on the at least one updated available article. 33.The computer system of claim 29, the completing the rental transactionincluding updating real-time availability data to reserve the at leastone available article identified by unique article identifier data. 34.The computer system of claim 29, the at least one category of the userincluding at least one of one or more users with a desired subscriptionstatus, one or more first-time users, one or more subscribing userswithout a subscription with the hosting entity, one or more prior usersof a transaction rental service, one or more targeted users targetedbased on a value of at least one previously rented article, one or morelow activity users with activity below a threshold activity level, orone or more high activity users with activity greater than the thresholdactivity level.
 35. A non-transitory computer-readable medium containinginstructions for performing functions for managing data associated withelectronic inventory management of wearable articles, the functionscomprising: receiving at least one user interaction with an electronicstorefront of a hosting entity displayed on a user device, the at leastone user interaction including a selection of a category selector or acharacteristic selector; determining at least one available articlecorresponding to the category selector or the characteristic selector;in response to determining the at least one available article, callingone or more APIs corresponding to one or more microservices, the one ormore microservices including one or more targeting microservices;performing a prioritization by the one or more targeting microservicesto determine at least one transaction rental call-to-action for the atleast one available article based on a user identifier or at least onecategory of a user; displaying the at least one transaction rentalcall-to-action on the electronic storefront of the hosting entity; andin response to receiving a user selection of the at least onetransaction rental call-to-action, completing a rental transactioncorresponding to the at least one available article.
 36. Thenon-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 35, the at least oneuser interaction including a selection of one or more articles of afulfiller entity or a viewing of the electronic storefront of thehosting entity.
 37. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim35, the at least one transaction rental call-to-action including adynamically-generated graphical element implemented via the one or moremicroservices.
 38. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim35, the functions further comprising: receiving a change to the categoryselector or the characteristic selector via at least one additional userinteraction; determining at least one updated available article thatmatches the category selector or the characteristic selector; andupdating the at least one transaction rental call-to-action based on theat least one updated available article.
 39. The non-transitorycomputer-readable medium of claim 35, the completing the rentaltransaction including updating real-time availability data to reservethe at least one available article identified by unique articleidentifier data.
 40. The non-transitory computer-readable medium ofclaim 35, the at least one category of the user including at least oneof one or more users with a desired subscription status, one or morefirst-time users, one or more subscribing users without a subscriptionwith the hosting entity, one or more prior users of a transaction rentalservice, one or more targeted users targeted based on a value of atleast one previously rented article, one or more low activity users withactivity below a threshold activity level, or one or more high activityusers with activity greater than the threshold activity level.